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For many years ACT has been utilized by individual businesspeople and small businesses, and in my opinion they have been ACT’s core group of users.  As ACT has evolved through the years it has become more complicated underneath the hood, while staying pretty much the same on the surface.

On the surface ACT is a valuable sales and marketing tool, but below the surface the software has become more complex and in my opinion quirky.  In fairness to ACT, and all software makers for that matter, designing software has become more complicated.  I’ve seen ACT run in to troubles that appear to have been caused by a simple Windows update.

Why is this important?

As an ACT user you might need to utilize the expertise of an ACT Certified Consultant (ACC), which I am not, and it is important to realize that it is unusual to find a consultant with both the required technical knowledge and the unique ability to teach ACT; having said that, you might need two ACT consultants instead of one.

My greatest skill is helping people utilize ACT as a sales and marketing tool; I love to teach people.  I know when to say to my clients that they need help from an ACT consultant more technical in nature and I will then help them explore their options.

Think of ACT like learning to drive and maintain your car, you wouldn’t necessarily want your car mechanic to be the one teaching you how to drive. 

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I had a client with a crazy sales manager…that is the only way I can describe this person.  You’d expect his character to be a regular on the popular television series “The Office.”  In fact, whenever I watch the show I always think of him.

I had to deal with this person all the time and had to learn how to deal with his most intriguing quirk. Whenever he would ask me a question about ACT, he would invariably interrupt me before I finished answering the question.  He would never ­- and I mean never – allow me to fully answer the question.

So what does this have to do with ACT?

His goal for ACT was to use it to track his salespeople using ACT sales opportunities, and he insisted that his salespeople meet with him on a weekly basis to discuss everything that was happening.  Basically, it was rehashing all the data that was simply a click away from him at any given moment.  On more than one occasion, I tried to tell him that he could utilize ACT more efficiently and in return not have to bother his salespeople with weekly meetings; but he never listened.

The dilemma that his salespeople faced was that they were using ACT in such a way that satisfied his need for information and not in a way that would help them sell every minute of every day.  The way the sales manager managed ACT was ineffective.

This sales manager was getting in the way of his salespeople selling; I tried to get him to understand that he could run a report on a salesperson and their sales opportunities in about 10 seconds to keep tabs on his salespeople.  But every time he asked me to show him how to run the reports he’d interrupt me and never fully learn how to do it.

Unfortunately, he was using ACT as a tool to control his salespeople (I can tell you that it was clear to me and to his salespeople that this was ACT’s purpose) and not as a tool to help them sell.

Ideally, all sales managers using ACT need to understand that they should never ask a salesperson to generate a sales report when they can do it themselves. Their focus should be on making sure that they help a salesperson and not get in their way.

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I have a client that uses ACT! and they brought me in to consult with them.

One of the issues they were trying to rectify was the fact that their salespeople were all using the software differently.  They asked me to help them centralize the data and simplify ACT! for their staff.

When I work with my client’s one of the first things I ask them to do is to forget about ACT!.  Quite often they get so caught up in the software that they lose site of their goals.  In many cases they don’t have clear cut goals or a simple plan. My experience has been that you need clear cut goals to make ACT! work effectively. 

Discussing the matter, my client’s new goals were twofold: they needed to get a handle on their sales representatives ACT! databases and they wanted to use that data to increase their marketing efforts.

The Outcome
Most of the salespeople were using Outlook to track and communicate with their current clients and the move to ACT! was awkward because they were ingrained with the way they do things.  Having stated that, I found that many of the reps were established and successful, and really didn’t feel the need to embrace the software.  I can fully appreciate their concerns; if it isn’t broke.

On another note, I eventually learned that all the sales reps were commission based and they were very protective of their data; therefore, they were hesitant to share it with the owners of the business.

Outlook is great email program but a poor contact manager.  When I asked the reps that used Outlook as their primary contact manager if they could produce a list of all of their clients and prospects, the answer was “sort of” in most cases.  And they surely would have to dig for the information and it would take time. 

It became obvious to me that their sales reps were successful working with about 20 percent of their client base while 80 percent was unaccounted for.  What I mean by that is that 80 percent of their clients were not easily reached.

I tried to convince the sales representatives that the main reason to use ACT! was to be able to quickly access the 80 percent of clients they were not actively pursuing.  If we could get those contacts into a centralized database, and have a marketing assistant follow-up with them, the salespeople and the company had everything to gain, because they weren’t currently pursuing these fantastic prospects (their existing clients) and the worse thing that could happen is a new sale.

Summary
Unfortunately, with 20-20 hindsight, this project was destined to fail because of the attitudes of the company and a commissioned sales staff.  Don’t get me wrong, the company was and is successful and their salespeople appear to be successful, so I’m not condemning the way they work.  It’s just the way they operate. The question in my mind and hopefully theirs is this: how much more successful could they be if they had organized ACT! (in the beginning) in a way that was conducive to helping their sales staff, not intruding on them?  I recognize this is easier said than done.

Footnote
I spoke to my client recently and they told me they are evaluating Salesforce CRM.  I believe they need to forget about the software and put into place a plan for new salespeople that will help centralize customer and prospect data.  Once they do that, the software will help them, regardless of what they choose.

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Many years ago ACT! developed a tool within ACT! (synchronization) that allowed you to keep two computers updated with your ACT! data; for example your office desktop and a notebook computer you might travel with.  Those tools within ACT! worked well, but not perfectly.

Today, because of our ability to connect to the internet in so many places, I question the need to sync at all.

If you use a tool such as GoToMyPC or LogMeIn, you have the ability to access your office computer and ACT! from any computer in the world that has internet access. In addition, you have access to all your other programs as well.

In a nutshell, your laptop computer becomes nothing more than a conduit to your primary computer and if it’s lost, stolen or destroyed you have lost nothing more than a machine. All of your valuable data will be safe on your desktop computer.

In my opinion, from a cost and technical point of view, this should be the first option most ACT! users explore.

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